I bought a table saw for £300 IIRC when we moved into the house and had a load of flooring to do. Now though I hardly use it and could use the space for something else so I am considering selling it.

When I do use it, its for long cuts in big pieces of wood or boards. Sometimes angled cuts. Can I do this sort of thing with a circular saw? Do they come with a fence so I don’t have to follow a line by hand? What if the cut is up the middle of a large board? Could I do something like that by clamping a straight piece of wood to the board and cut against that?

Any use?

http://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/what-sawskills-for-basic-woodwork-cutting-square

[video]https://youtu.be/eiYoBbEZwlk[/video]

Watch out for your fingers!

I use a Festool Rail saw for all cutting. I don’t think you need to spend Festool prices as long as it’s got a good rail.

My rail is only 1400mm long but I use it for cutting straight lines in 2800mm long 18mm thick boards. Just keep moving it along anothe metre or so, leaving the blade in the cut to keep it aligned. It has a couple of neoprene strips on the underside so it stays where you want it without clamping.

I have made a couple of jigs to help me cut right angle crosscuts on thin strips up to 300mm wide, and cut lengthways thin strips. It also does 45degree mitre cuts. I’ve done a corner wardrobe that needed a 42degree mitre and a 48 degree mitre along a 2200mm join and it was perfect.

I also do my scribing (making an undulating cut to match an uneven wall or ceiling) using the rail.

Given that you can transport all the stuff you need in the back of an estate car, and given that I do very few repetitive cuts, I’d take the Rail saw over a table saw and a chop saw every time.

Hand held circular saws are best for cutting up large pieces of wood – keep the big cumbersome wood still and hold the saw. Tablesaws are better for smaller pieces of wood. The nice big saw stays still and you hold and move the small bit of wood.

If you’ve already got the table saw then you’ll find a hand held saw a useful companion. I tend to cut boards into manageable sizes with the hand saw then trim them accurately with the table saw.

A plunge / rail system is the best of both worlds and also is good when you’re tight for space. If you want to cut an 8ft board with a table saw you need 8ft of clear space in front and behind the saw plus room for yourself. With a rail saw you only need the space the board itself takes up. Even with a rail saw I still tend to rough out with the rails saw and trim with a table saw if I have to make a lot of repetitive pieces.

Could I do something like that by clamping a straight piece of wood to the board and cut against that?

Look up youtube tutorials about making your own saw guide – basically a DIY version of the Festool / Mafell rail. Works well enough – the commercial version just refines the process and is quicker to set and work with. With a cheap saw though there can be a risk that the blade and footplate of the saw don’t run exactly true to each other – so if you try to follow a guide the saw will be fighting against it

I don’t think you need to spend Festool prices as long as it’s got a good rail.

Dewalt and Makita make versions of the Festool saw/rail – infact the rails are interchangeable – but since they launched them Festool’s prices have dropped so theres not a huge saving really. Some cheaper brands do rail saws too but scour the reviews – they can have flaws – Sheppach’s version seems very cheap but if you angle the blade it cuts through the splinter guard. Some brands supply their saws with very short rails and additional rails can be difficult to source.

All circular saw come with guide, if you want to cut beyond the limits of the guide just use a straight edge and a couple of clamps (or screw down the straight edge).

I can’t see the point of buying a guide rail system such as Festool unless you will be regularly ripping up wide boards.

The correct answer is obvious, both 🙂

And while folk who know what they are doing can do most things with very little, ie a handsaw, for the rest of us a table saw is I find a safe way of cutting wood.

I had a £100 B&Q special for years, did everything with it until it went ‘pop’. Luckily I’ve a huge building for my workshop, 12×5 metres, so bought a large cast iron tablesaw.

So for me, look at how you can store it better maybe (when I only had a single garage the table saw slipped in below a wardrobe I used for my motorcycle gear)?

I’ve got a portable table, fixed table, sliding mitre, Festool rail saw, jigsaw, battery circular etc etc. Basically, the full set, and the one I use most without question is the Festool.

I can’t see the point of buying a guide rail system such as Festool unless you will be regularly ripping up wide boards.

Ripping wide boards is the thing I do least. I make wardrobes and bedroom furniture to a pretty good standard.

Make a mark, slap on the rail, zizz up the rail. Result; a beautiful clean cut both sides, the offcut is also clean both sides. Dead accurate and super quick.

Something like the Festool TS55 is the dogs pizzle. Lay a sheet or strip of sacrificial ply/mdf on the floor, lay your material ontop, mark it off, lay the non-slip guide rail (work to the correct side of the line!) up to your marks, set the plunge depth to 1mm more than the material, plug in an extractor and cut away for a perfect, clean cut with almost zero mess.

Ripping wide boards is the thing I do least. I make wardrobes and bedroom furniture to a pretty good standard.

I suspect that molgrips doesn’t intend to make wardrobes and bedroom furniture. He asks about using a circular saw “for long cuts in big pieces of wood or boards”, I think a circular saw would be fine for that.

Obviously if he intends to make wardrobes and bedroom furniture to a pretty good standard, like you do for a living, then a Festool kit would make sense.

Yes. This is occasional DIY. Biggest thing I used it for was a new structural shelf for the caravan.

I need more too storage, Halfords have a nice cabinet half price but the only place it can go is where the table saw I hardly use is.

Sounds like I could get away with a circular saw though, and it looks like the table saw will fetch enough to pay for one on eBay.

I spent a year living on a community farm in Germany. One of the lads there at the same time as me was a trainee “Zimmerman”, basically a carpenter specialising in building work, especially the old style oak framed buildings of the area. He had one power tool in his box, a large Makita hand held circular saw (think it was a 30cm blade). What that lad couldn’t make with that saw wasn’t worth making. Saying that a Zimmerman is a job involving a lot of travelling so large tools were not an option for them.

A slight aside… I used to use a sacrificial sheet under the cut but when I went to an exhibition and had a chat with Festool’s tech guy he insisted the only time to use a sacrificial sheet was when trimming a new rail splinter guard.
He said to make sure a whole tooth was visible below the cut as it helps clear the waste and stops chipping.
Since then I’ve done what he says and I’ve had reliable clean cuts.

People do build their own temporary table saws using hand held circular saws but with no guard etc, they can be a little sketchy… 😕

[video]http://youtu.be/NhORUN6oCUc[/video]

^^^^ yeah, my old geology teach cut his hand off with his home made one of those! 😯

Shit 😯

Must say I wouldn’t fancy it.

^^^^ yeah, my old geology teach cut his hand off with his home made one of those!

It’s really difficult to pick up your own fingers. Slippery little devils.

I have a Triton TBD100 saw bench which, once set up, gives you the best of both worlds. Essentially you hang a circular saw underneath and use it as a table saw. Folds down to about 20cm high iirc

This weekend I was planning on making 2 of these….

a 2.4 m one and 1.2 m one for ripping sheets of 18mm ply.

But I have mainly been messing about on here/on the bike/Ebay instead 🙁

[video]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N5R_XPYl5kE[/video]

I did make a big temporary table to do it on though so I at least i did something.

It’s going. On eBay tonight.

You can make a good ripping guide for a normal circular saw. They do ware out but nine has last a few years of regular use and is still good

Like this

[video]https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=oiSz7kPwFY0[/video]